A couple of Pennsylvania master criminals who robbed a petrol station were cuffed after their getaway vehicle ran out of petrol a mile from the scene of the crime.
According to AP, 29-year-old Lonnie Meckwood and 51-year-old Phillip Weeks hit the Quickway Convenience Store in Kirkwood, close to the New York-Pennsylvania border, …

merkins

Re: Whats the IT aspect?

You know, what worries me is that something unfortunate will happen to me and after I'm gone there will still be Reg commentards wanting to know what the IT angle is on a non-IT story. Listen to me. WE RUN NON-IT STORIES. WE DO IT ALL THE TIME. WE ALWAYS HAVE. WRITE IT DOWN 20 TIMES AND THEN FLUSH YOUR FACE IN THE TOILET.

Can anyone help me out here? Do you think a hearty chorus of 'Sometimes there is no IT angle' might do it?

Re: Whats the IT aspect?

@Sarah Bee

What I don't think most techies understand is that as a group we are for the most part indicatively socially inept and el reg posts stories that it's readership will find amusing - we love to show how superior we are and scoff at others epic failures....

I wonder how many of the commentards are actually over weight middle aged men wearing double breasted suits (see consultant)

IT Angle

You would have to really work hard these days to find a story which is amusing/interesting which doesn't at some point have an IT element.......Let's see now, if it is on El Reg then you are reading it on a computer...that do?

There might be a logical reason for this

Although it's always amusing to laugh at the stupidity of others (which is why I read the comment threads here), there is a possible and plausible explanation for this sillyness - in the US you usually have pre-pay for your fuel before filling up, so filling up and then robbing the attendant wouldn't be an option. They'd have to pay, fill up, then rob the attendant to get their money back.

Not again. Stop whinging.

Sometimes it's good to find some funny diversions to let us forget how shit hardware, software and companies are.

I, for one, appreciate an ironic diversion of a story instead of the thought of a) outstanding work and b) that I'm going to have to spend a couple of hours tonight proving a motherboard failure after my main computer repeatedly failed to boot last night. Joy.. (to be fair, it's worked fine for months up until now, but it's still bloody annoying)

@Mrs Bee

There is an IT angle

"Can anyone help me out here?"

Whoa, easy tigress!

There is an IT angle - obviously the meatware implementation failed to process the messages being sent from the user interface. Either the multiple redundancy features, consisting of warning light and fuel gauge suffered a simultaneous outage or the meatware unit's connection failed.

Re Sarah

'Can anyone help me out here?' certainly can,

It would be a great shame not to publish such gems as these, Darwin award or not - dont you have to die by some really foolish method for nomination? looking down the barrel of a gun for the sign that says 'trigger at other end' or something similar, anyway life would be dull without such amusing anecdotes sprinkled into El Reg

Whilst the suggested remedy of flushing down the loo is a tad excessive, Im sure a Google or a Bing - if that way inclined, for 'sense of humour' may be all thats required.

@How long before

when they permanently remove themselves from the gene pool, usually by killing themslves in a particularly stupid but entertaining fashion, and not before. Entertaining as this story is, it's not even remotely near a Darwin award story

umm

Trust me, Ms. Bee, you don't want to ask a bunch of (mostly male) techies what they are wearing right now.

And yes, I am middle aged; my wife hints that I'm overweight (I haven't sprung L. Page's arguments about BMI on her); but No, I'm not wearing a double-breasted suit.. (In the states this is a virtual Friday.)

@ Mistress Bee

'no IT angle icon'

Of course what happens when the 'no IT angle' icon is selected is that the user's posted message text is replaced by 'I am a moron. Sometimes these articles are for fun' and the icon morphs into a dunce hat.

From personal experience, there's not a large difference in having to point out the incredibly obvious to people on more or less money than you, especially when the error message is in 72 point flashing pink and yet they still fail to notice.

I am not thick and do not wish to melt, so am wearing shorts and a t shirt. Neither am I middle aged or overweight although someone had the cheek to suggest my most recent birthday was 'middle aged'. Given that the life expectancy will probably raise to 90 or so soon, I'm not admitting to middle age until I hit forty and beyond.

@Ms. Bee

@Sarah Bee

Really, I think there's only 1 solution to this: When people sign up for an account here in the forums, there should be a giant 20 pt. warning that sometimes there are non-IT stories. Should they post a complaint anyway, wipe their account and ban their email address from creating a new one.

All that leaves are the people who have created an account already but haven't quite got the message, and I think a small grace period - say 6 months - during which they are allowed one - and no more than one - violation should suffice. After that, problem solved.